Definition
Tings (also rendered "the tings") refers to the nisi prius sittings held at Westminster or in the Guildhall of London for the trial of causes arising principally in London or Middlesex. The term designates a specific institutional venue and occasion for civil jury trials in the English court system, distinct from the general assize circuits that served the rest of the country. Because London and Middlesex occupied a unique jurisdictional position — they were not served by the ordinary assize judges on circuit in the same manner as other counties — these dedicated sittings filled the equivalent function within the metropolitan area.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): Plural of "ting," a light ringing or chiming sound.
Historical common usage: No relevant common-law English meaning in Webster's 1913 connects to this legal term.
Editorial note: The legal term "tings" bears no relationship whatsoever to the ordinary English word. Researchers encountering "tings" in historical legal documents should not read it as a colloquial or phonetic spelling; it is a term of art referring to a specific court sitting arrangement in English legal practice.
Common Confusion
Tings should not be confused with the general nisi prius system as it operated throughout England. Outside London and Middlesex, nisi prius trials were conducted by assize judges traveling on circuit. Tings were the metropolitan counterpart — a localized substitute for that circuit system. The term is also sometimes loosely grouped with "Guildhall Sittings" (trials held specifically in the Guildhall of London) and "sittings at Westminster," but these are technically separate venues within the broader category. Researchers should consult the entries for TERM, NISI PRIUS, and GUILDHALL SITTINGS together when tracing how metropolitan civil trial business was organized.
Why It Matters in Research
Tings is a historically narrow term with almost no application outside English legal sources from roughly the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Researchers working in English civil procedure materials from that period will encounter it as a scheduling and venue concept — understanding it is essential for reading court reports, practitioner manuals, and pleading records that refer to where and when metropolitan causes were tried.
The term appears in sources organized around the English term-and-sitting structure, which divided the legal year into terms (when courts sat at Westminster for formal business) and sittings (when nisi prius trials actually occurred). Tings fall within that sitting structure. Because American legal materials largely did not transplant this specific institutional arrangement — American courts developed their own circuit and term systems — the term is almost entirely absent from U.S. legal sources. Researchers using Law Mind for American legal history will rarely encounter it; those working in English legal history or comparative procedure will need it as an orienting concept.
Bouvier includes the term with a cross-reference to TERM and GUILDHALL SITTINGS, signaling that it cannot be understood in isolation. A researcher who encounters "tings" in a nineteenth-century English practice manual without following those cross-references risks misreading the procedural context entirely.
Historical Dictionary Support
Bouvier's Law Dictionary provides the only historical legal dictionary entry for this term in the Law Mind corpus. Bouvier's definition is brief but precise: nisi prius sittings at Westminster or the Guildhall of London, principally for London and Middlesex causes, with a citation to 3 Stephen's Commentaries 514. Stephen's Commentaries on the Laws of England is a reliable primary source for this institutional description, and Bouvier's reliance on it is appropriate.
No competing definitions or divergent accounts appear in the corpus. The brevity of the entry reflects the term's function as a label for a specific procedural institution rather than a legal concept requiring analytical development. Historical dictionaries contemporary with Bouvier (mid-nineteenth century) were writing at a moment when these sittings were still a live feature of English practice; later sources treat the term as historical.
Jurisdictional Note
Tings is an English legal term with no recognized American equivalent. Its relevance is confined to English civil procedure, primarily from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Researchers working in Scottish, Irish, or other common-law jurisdictions will not encounter the term in its technical sense.